


Behind the Dungeon Door

by Xamelyon



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Hogwarts House Sorting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-17
Updated: 2019-02-17
Packaged: 2019-10-30 03:00:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17820545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xamelyon/pseuds/Xamelyon
Summary: When Iris Snape appeared among the new crop of students at Hogwarts, everyone knew exactly what to expect. And they were all wrong.





	Behind the Dungeon Door

-1-

 

No one had really noticed the girl on the train. She’d sat in one corner by a window, leaning her forehead against the glass so that her straight black hair formed a curtain around her face, radiating an air of "don't bother me" that no one had bothered to crack. The first-years assumed she was a returning student, and so above their touch. The returning students were too absorbed in renewing old friendships and enmities to pay any notice of a first-year who was so clearly trying to be invisible. So it was that the first hint any of the other students had that something out of the ordinary might be happening came when they disembarked from the Hogwarts Express and saw that the usual roster of faculty greeters had been joined by Professor Snape, standing back from the others with his arms folded and his face in its usual sneering mask.

"What's _he_ doing here?" Harry muttered to his friends, glancing sideways as they passed. But for once Snape seemed to be ignoring all opportunities to torment his least favorite students.

Hermione glanced back and then tugged at Harry's and Ron's sleeves. "Hang on a moment--maybe we'll find out."

They lagged back behind the other exiting students, not quite enough to be noticed but enough to overhear. When the sullen black-haired girl came down the steps, Snape unfolded his arms and stepped forward to catch her eye. She looked up at him with an expression something of apprehension, something of relief.

"So," Snape said abruptly, "you found the platform all right."

"Yes, sir," she answered, with a promptness that argued for past experience. "Mother couldn't..."

"I know," he interrupted. "Go with the other first-years," he said, pointing to the group gathering at one end of the platform. Then he turned and left.

She stared after him for a moment, then her head tilted forward and her hair once again fell to hide her face as she dragged her luggage in the indicated direction.

The three watchers looked at each other and shrugged, then hurried off to the waiting carriages.

 

The mystery was solved soon in a most unexpected way when the new students were called, one by one, to be Sorted. She stood fourth from the end of the line, waiting while Germanius Smith was quickly directed toward the Ravenclaw tables to the boisterous cheers of his new house-mates. Then Professor McGonagall glanced at her list and read off, "Iris Snape."

First the hall went dead silent. Then a wave of whispers washed across the room.

"Snape?" Ron asked incredulously. "How? I mean...he's not married...at least, we've never heard of..."

Hermione frowned at him. "Maybe she's a cousin or something."

"No, she must be his daughter," Ginny said. "I overheard one of the other professors saying something about how awkward it must be to teach your own children."

Harry grimaced. "Well that settles it--she'll be Slytherin for sure. And if you think you've seen favoritism before..."

And then the next unexpected thing happened. When Iris took her place on the stool, blushing so brightly her pale skin almost glowed, and the Sorting Hat was settled on her head, it didn't render the instant decision everyone expected. Instead it hemmed and hawed and muttered to itself. "Very strange. Very strange indeed. Not at all what I would have thought. But there's no question about it--you're meant for Gryffindor."

For a second time, dead silence hit the hall, broken by the scrape of Professor Snape's chair as he came to his feet protesting, "That's impossible!"

"Evidently it _is_ possible, Severus," said Dumbledore mildly. "The Hat knows what it's about. And it may be for the best that she isn't placed in your House." He gave Iris a friendly nod and smile that she missed entirely.

She had thrown her father one panicked glance and then looked desperately around the hall. McGonagall leaned over and whispered something in her ear while pointing out the Gryffindor tables. Unlike the previous students, she didn't have cheers and waves to guide her in the right direction--the Gryffindors, one and all, were sitting in open-jawed astonishment, like nearly every other student in the room. Belatedly, several of the professors at the head table began clapping politely and there were scattered echoes among the students that died out quickly as McGonagall read off the name of Archibald Tamlinson and the next student stepped up to the Hat.

Iris paused at the end of the table, looking for an empty seat, but between the previous Sorts and natural spread there wasn't an obvious place left. Finally Angelina looked down the table to find an untaken place setting and whispered, "Ginny, scoot down and make room." Ginny glared at her in outrage and opened her mouth, but anything she might have had to say was lost in the cheering from Hufflepuff as Archibald was Sorted off. So she shrugged and moved down on the bench, then turned away to her other side to say something to one of the other new Gryffindors--a girl with hair in tight dark ringlets and a face reminiscent of Greek sculpture to match her name of Persephone. Iris slipped carefully down the row and sat in the open space, then hunched into herself and looked down at her plate as her hair settled into its customary curtaining position.

 

By the time dinner was over and the Houses trooped off to their rooms, most of the Gryffindors had managed temporarily to forget about the cuckoo's egg that had been slipped into their midst. It was easy enough to do--throughout dinner she had never once spoken or looked up from her plate. And when the new first-years had been shown to their dormitory, instead of going back down into the common room, she opened her trunk and began removing a startlingly large number of books and arranging them carefully on the cabinet beside her bed.

Half an hour later, when she had unpacked every conceivable object, and rearranged them for the third time, and then after sitting on the edge of her bed staring into space for an eternity, Iris slipped silently down the stairs with the air of one entering a nest of shriggle-newts. A familiar name stopped her on the bottom step. She hadn't sorted out their voices enough to know who was speaking.

"It's going to be a nightmare!" It was a boy's voice. "Everything we do and say is going to be reported to Snape."

There was an indecipherable murmur in response, then the boy's voice again. "I don't care what the Sorting Hat thinks, blood's thicker than water."

"And did you see how she looked at us?" It was a girl's voice this time. "Nearly curdled my pumpkin juice."

Another comment of similar wit was lost in the general laughter as Iris turned on the stair and climbed it again.

When the other girls finally went up to the dormitory, Iris was an unmoving lump under the covers.

 

-2-

 

When the Gryffindors rose in the morning, Iris’s bed was empty. If she’d been to breakfast, no one had seen her. When they arrived at Professor McGonagall's transformations class for their first Hogwarts lesson, she was already sitting in place, bent over an open notebook with quill in hand. And yet...there was nothing you could really fault her for. When called on, she knew every answer, but she never pushed forward to volunteer. When they were set to attempting their first transformation--a simple color-change of a glass goblet--Iris frowned in concentration, stared at her goblet with narrowed eyes for two full minutes, then tapped it sharply with her wand and said, " _Varicoloris!_ " in a soft, but very precise voice. A deep green spread instantly from the point of contact. She had put too much effort into the act for it to be completely insulting to the rest of the class as they struggled to get more results than a brief deepening of hue, but it was impressive enough that McGonagall delightedly assigned ten points to Gryffindor. It was only when Iris then rapidly took the goblet through several more colors and finished with a swirled pattern of reds and golds that a voice from the back row hissed, "Showoff!" She put her wand down on the desk and fixed her eyes on the goblet until they were released from class.

History of Magic was uneventful only because Professor Binn's monotonous teaching style left no room for students either to shine or embarrass themselves. But there was no escaping lunch. Awkwardness swirled like a summer fog. Iris pushed the food around on her plate and only looked up to dart sidewise glances at the head table. After the first few students had finished, she pushed the plate away and slipped out.

The dire awfulness of Potions class was legendary among Gryffindors, so there was a certain conflict among the first-years between a natural dread and the anticipation of watching the irresistible force of Professor Snape's spite collide the immoveable object of Iris Snape's brilliant sullenness. Their dread was confirmed, but their anticipation was left unfulfilled. Iris once again answered every question without volunteering, completed every task perfectly with visible effort, and wasn't spared the acid side of Snape's tongue for that visible effort. She took the correction with the same serious intensity as she had taken McGonagall's praise, answering simply, "Yes, sir," and turning back to the task at hand. The universal opinion in the corridors when they were released was that Iris Snape couldn't possibly be for real.

 

And so classes continued in the first few days. It was abundantly clear that Iris was likely to be the star pupil of the year, but there was none of the earnest desperation that had marked Hermione Granger's introduction to Hogwarts--instead Iris seemed almost indifferent to anyone else's opinion of her work, whether teacher or student. Only Charms provided a real break from the pattern. The fierce concentration that had served her so well in Transformations proved a hindrance when Professor Flitwick set them to learn an easy candle-lighting charm.

"No, no, no," he said, guiding her hand into position. Your wrist is too stiff. Let it _roll_ through you."

Iris shook his hand off and repeated her precise motion. The wick smoked slightly.

Flitwick moved on to the next students in the row and cheered delightedly as Constance Keenan's candle burst into a bright glow.

With a deepening frown, Iris muttered the charm over and over again, each time with a careful wave of her wand. The wick had ceased smoking. Finally she set the wand down and simply stared at the candle for a long time. But when the other students began restlessly to signal the end of the hour, she raised her wand again, scowled at the candle, and made a deeply fluid motion while exclaiming, " _Incendio_!" The wick did not burn. Or rather, it did not simply burn. The entire candle exploded in a ball of flame that scorched the desk and came close to setting fire to the hair of the girl sitting in the next row up.

"Well, well," Professor Flitwick said after he had vanished the flames and returned the desktop to its original condition. "You certainly have the power down properly, but you need to work a bit on control. You should...that is, all of you should practice until you have this charm perfectly. Technique is half of any charm. If you learn proper technique at the first it will serve you well for all. And Miss Snape," he turned back to her from addressing the class, "for now perhaps you should practice your inflaming in a fireplace rather than on a desktop."

 

That was why, when the Gryphondors started trailing into the common room after dinner, they found Iris (who on previous evenings had forsaken the Gryffindor commons for the library whenever possible) sitting cross-legged in front of the hearth, staring intently with her wand clutched in hand, alternately making the logs burst into flame and fall back to bare wood. The others swirled around her like a stream around a rock until Oliver snapped in exasperation, "If you're quite done showing off, I'm bloody well tired of roasting and freezing with every breath. This is a _common_ room, not your private playground."

She sat still for a moment then stood up and moved towards the stairs to the dormitory but turned at the last moment and, with a wave and a final, " _Incendio_!" set every candle in the room blazing. The vision that carried her up the stairs was a hint of fear in more than one face. But having chosen the direction for her exit, she was denied the chance to slip unobtrusively off to the library for the evening, and was forced to spend it in the dormitory , trying to balance a parchment on her lap in bed to finish her assignments before falling asleep with _Kinesthetics of the Wand_ fallen open beside her on the coverlet.

 

-3-

 

What couldn't last was the dodging of meals. There had to be a balance between the two aches in her belly. But the rest settled into a routine for the remainder of the first week, and Iris was not the only one who wondered when it would break. One of those who wondered was the Head of Gryffindor House.

"Iris, could you stay a moment?" Professor McGonagall asked at the end of Friday's class amid the shuffling of books and parchments.

Iris responded with her mechanical, "Yes, Professor," and sat once more with her hands folded on top of her books.

When the last of the other students had left, McGonagall asked, "And how do you like Hogwarts so far?"

Iris shrugged. "Classes are ok. They're harder than at my old school--I mean, even besides the magic. But it's easier to learn spells and things when you really get to do them."

"Yes, I can tell you enjoy the work. Don't let the other students take too much advantage of you when their assignments come due."

Iris shrugged again and looked away.

The professor hesitated before her next question, probing carefully. "Have you had a chance to make any particular friends yet?"

That was too much even for Iris's carefully managed composure. She turned to look the professor in the eye. "It was a mistake, wasn't it? The hat putting me in Gryffindor? It can make mistakes, can't it? I don't belong there--everyone knows it." There was the hint of a quaver in her voice as she finished.

McGonagall's face turned grim. "It's not for the students to decide who belongs and who doesn't. You were Sorted into Gryffindor and that's what matters. Is anyone giving you a hard time?"

Iris looked away again. At this point the shrug was pure reflex. "To do that they'd have to notice that I exist." She stood up. "May I go? I'm going to be late for my next class."

As McGonagall watched her leave, her mouth set into a grim line and she thought, _This has gone on much too long._

 

-4-

 

When the owl post arrived on Saturday morning, Hermione was startled to discover an invitation from Professor McGonagall to come to tea in her office that afternoon. Not that it was an improbable event, but it wasn't McGonagall's habit to have student conferences over tea. Stranger still, it seemed that Ginny was also invited, as well as Persephone from the first years.

Ginny was the only one who ventured an opinion. "Maybe it's some sort of special project,"

They arrived to find McGonagall already pouring a cup for Iris, who sat perched stiffly on the edge of a comfortable chair. Ginny and Hermione exchanged questioning looks, then plunged into the ritual of passing cups and pouring. It began as the most awkward conversation any of them had been a party to. McGonagall turned brightly to Iris and asked, "And how is your mother doing these days?" Since it had not previously occurred to the other girls to speculate about Iris's other parent, they leaned forward curiously.

Iris hunched into herself and fixed her eyes steadily on her teacup. "She's fine, I suppose. She isn't there much."

"No, I suppose she wouldn't be, what with...everything. Where is she being sent these days."

That automatic shrug again. "I don't know. She never tells me any more. She used to. Now I just get up and find a note on the kitchen table, and then two weeks later she's back and she quizzes me on my schoolwork and we pretend nothing happened. I think she was glad to send me away to school so that she didn't need to worry about who was taking care of me." She started to say something else, hesitated, then said, "She promised she'd see me to the train, but she had to leave again a week before the term started."

McGonagall frowned, "I hadn't heard that. However did you get to the station?"

This time the chin came up defiantly, at odds with a deep blush. "A Muggle cab." She looked around as if daring anyone to react.

"All by yourself?" Persephone gasped. "Wow!"

"Well, it's not like it's _really_ that hard," Ginny added to fill the gap when Iris fell silent again. "Our Dad takes us on Muggle busses sometimes. He thinks it's important to know how."

"So, Ginny," McGonagall took the reins of conversation again. "You seem to be successfully emerging from the faceless mass of Weasleys."

Ginny giggled. "I never thought of it that way. Yeah, at first...well, at first it was just awful, what with being possessed by...You Know Who and all. But you could see everybody thinking, 'Is she going to be another Percy? Is she going to be another Fred-and-George?' But, yeah, this year I think I finally get to be Ginny."

"It can be hard to have a reputation precede you." She was still talking to Ginny, but looking sideways at Iris. "Harder still when it's someone else's reputation that precedes you, and you still need to live up to it or live it down." She leaned over to pour Hermione another cup of tea. "Now, you had the opposite problem, of course. No one had any expectations at all of what you would be like, and you worked so hard to impress us all."

"That wasn't really it," Hermione answered slowly as she stirred a sugar-lump around in circles. "The schoolwork was just because...well, because I love _knowing_ things. But I really felt like...there was all this stuff that everyone else just _knew_ from having grown up in wizarding families. And I didn't know any of it, so I had so much to catch up on. But it wasn't school stuff--it was everyday stuff."

Iris had shot her a startled glance in the midst of this and McGonagall answered the question she wasn't asking. "You know that Hermione's Muggle-born, of course. The first wizard in her entire family," she finished proudly. "So, Persephone, I understand your parents are traveling too?"

The girl nodded vigorously, setting her dark ringlets bouncing. "They're off to Cyprus to visit Gran. I wanted to go, but Mum was so busy finishing her book over the summer that they had to put it off. Gran _promised_ she'd try to find a Small-leaf Daphnid for me to send back with them in a pot, but I was hoping we'd be able to go looking for one together. They're really rare in Cyprus now, and of course you can't find them in England at all anymore."

For the first time Iris broke the wall of silence she'd set between her and the other girls. "I had a Daphnid in the back garden once--broad-leaf variegated. But it got the blight and died. Mum helped me try all the potions in the book, but nothing worked."

"It's a new strain of blight," Hermione offered. "Doesn't respond to any of the standard charms. _Modern Herbology_ says the issue has sort of fallen through the cracks because they're still arguing whether Daphnids should be classed as plants or magical creatures."

Persephone was gazing at Hermione with her mouth in an "O" of adoration that an Older Student would take an interest in her hobbies. "Maybe it's better if they don't bring me one, then," she said. "I'd be so sad if it died."

"The thing to do," Iris said sharply, "is to see that it doesn't. There's no point in being given nice things if you don't take care of them." It had the air of a recited lesson. "If _I_ had another Daphnid, I'd work until I found a cure for the blight."

Persephone was visibly quelled, but McGonagall offered, "It's possible that Professor Sprout may have one tucked away somewhere that she'd be willing to let you work with. You'd need to convince her that you weren't simply playing around. The two of you could work on the project together." She emphasized the last word ever so slightly.

That was when Hermione figured out the pattern of McGonagall's purpose and sat back go admire the deftness with which the professor teased out threads of common interest and experience to pull Iris into interaction with the other girls. Iris didn't help as much as she might have, being prone to biting observations and sudden silences. But by the time McGonagall started collecting cups to signal an end, it seemed firmly established that Iris and Persephone were going to be, if not exactly friends, at least working partners.

As the younger girls headed out the door, McGonagall said casually, "Hermione, perhaps you might help me tidy things up a bit." But when the door was closed, she set the tea things back down on the table instead and turned on Hermione with a crackling edge of anger. "What happened to Iris at the Sorting was completely inexcusable. I have never been so ashamed of my House before in my life!"

Hermione could only stare at her open-mouthed.

"We were all somewhat surprised by the Hat's decision, of course--I won't say I wasn't a bit taken aback myself. But I have _never_ seen a new student treated as shabbily as all of you treated Iris Snape. At the time I assumed that it would all work itself out, but it has become clear to me that Something Must Be Done."

"It wasn't entirely our fault," Hermione said hesitantly, knowing the excuse was as thin as it sounded. "She's always going off by herself, and she won't even say so much as 'Hello' to anyone. She hasn't made the slightest effort--"

"And can you blame her? I should think that you, of all people, would know what it feels like to get off on the wrong foot. I should think that Potter would know as well, but I don't suppose I can expect him to drop his prejudices in this case."

"A lot of the students think she's carrying tales to Professor Snape."

McGonagall's eyebrows rose skeptically.

"Ma-- one of the students borrowed part of someone else's potions homework and Professor Snape already knew about it when she turned it in. How would he know unless Iris told him? She was there."

"I'm surprised at you, Miss Granger." McGonagall's voice was cold. "Most potions, however carefully made, carry a signature from the maker. And when we're talking about student assignments, it would be the easiest thing in the world to observe that two student potions were entirely too similar to be separate work. Besides which, it doesn't take any special knowledge to observe that Marion Craddock does as little of her own work as she can get away with. I know for a fact that Iris has not spoken with her father outside of the classroom since the evening you all arrived on the train. If you have other excuses as feeble as that one to offer I shall be extremely disappointed."

Hermione blushed fiercely and shook her head.

The professor's voice turned somewhat milder. "I wish you to make it a special project to see that this situation changes for the better. It won't be easy and Iris won't make it any easier." She paused a moment to choose her words carefully. "She hasn't had much practice in trusting people or relying on them."

"Why me?" It came out more truculently than she intended but the professor chose to ignore the tone.

"First, because you _can_. You've learned the knack of letting things roll off of you. You may not be able to teach Iris to do it, but you should be able to put up with her long enough to get through. Second, because the two of you share a deep need to know and understand everything. It will be a useful bond at times when nothing else seems likely to work. If all else fails, ask to borrow one of her books. You may be surprised at the result."

 

-5-

 

The tables in the hall had just started to thin out as the first students started leaving for the holidays. The remainder were divided between the twitchy packed-and-ready crowd and those beginning to feel that odd sensation that the school was somehow more _theirs_ for staying over. Hermione had left the day before, Persephone's bags were waiting in the entryway. Iris had been up past midnight sorting through which books she wanted to take and had yet to tuck a few clothes around them for padding. At the upper end of the table, Harry and the Weasleys had their heads together plotting one of their inevitable secret quests.

The morning owls were thin as well--the usual scattering of _Daily Prophets_ , but not much in the way of mail, and it was too early for gifts to start arriving. Persephone jabbed Iris in the ribs. "Isn't that your mother's owl?"

Iris watched the dark brown barn owl circle once in the eaves with a sinking feeling. It soared past her and alit in the middle of the staff table where it sidled over towards her father. He looked down at it with narrowed eyes, pulled the letter free, then read it, shooing the owl away with his other hand. At last he stood up and walked around to the Gryffindor table, past the startled and guilty-looking group at the end and up to where Iris was waiting apprehensively.

"It seems your mother has been called away unexpectedly. You are to spend your holidays with me, that is to say, here."

There wasn't much to say except, "Oh."

Persephone took up the disappointment. "But this is awful! If you found out a few days ago I could have asked my parents if you could stay with us."

"That," Snape said quellingly, "would not be acceptable." With no further explanation, he returned to the staff table.

Iris stared down at her plate. The toast had become cardboard. In response to no one at all she said, "It doesn't matter. She probably would have been called away anyway and then I'd get to spend Christmas with the house-elf, and Mrs. Crodgett would come around and I'd have to pretend that Mum had just gone out shopping because I'm not supposed to tell anyone when she's gone. Oh bother. I should have caught Kipple before he flew off. I could have sent her present back with him."

"Well I think it stinks," Persephone said. "You might as well not _have_ any parents. Oops--I need to go. I wish you could come with me."

Iris twitched a smile at her. "Have a good holiday. I hope your grandmother found a Daphnid for you."

 

-6-

 

It was several weeks after the start of the new term that Professor Snape unexpectedly interrupted Iris's History of Magic class. Or rather, made a valiant effort to interrupt it, for it took some time for Professor Binns to notice his presence. Those who had begun to notice and track fine distinctions in the range of Snape's sneers and scowls might have discerned a deeper tension--a greater pallidness. When he was finally acknowledged, he announced, "Professor Dumbledore would like to see Miss Snape in his office, if you please." As usual, his tone made it clear that anyone else's pleasure was the last priority on his mind. He gestured abruptly to Iris and turned on his heel.

She wasn't truly worried until she found not only Dumbledore but Professor McGonagall waiting for her there. _What have I done?_ she thought in a panic.

Dumbledore cleared his throat. "Iris, you know that your mother has been on a very important mission. A very important and a very dangerous one."

Snape interrupted him angrily. "Dumbledore, stop torturing the girl and have out with it!"

A pit opened in Iris's stomach. "No," she whispered. Then louder, "No." She took a step backward as if she could retreat from the inevitable but ran up against her father. His hands closed on her shoulders so that she couldn't flee.

"I'm afraid she has disappeared," Dumbledore continued. “We received an owl less than an hour ago. Nothing is certain, but we fear the worst."

Iris stood frozen, biting her lip hard enough to make blood come while they all watched her closely. _What do they want from me?_ she thought desperately.

At last Professor McGonagall made a movement towards her saying, "My poor child. It's perfectly acceptable to cry."

But Iris thrust her chin forward and said with only the slightest quaver, "A Snape does not cry over what cannot be mended."

McGonagall shot Severus a venomous look. "Is this what you...?"

"Iris and I are going for a walk," he said abruptly, releasing his grip on her shoulders only to push her toward the door.

When they had gone, McGonagall looked worriedly at Dumbledore. "Do you think it's wise ...?"

"He is her father," the headmaster said.

"He isn't fit to comfort a child!"

Dumbledore shook his head firmly. "I know you don't care to admit it, Minerva, but Iris is his daughter in spirit, not only in body. He will know what she needs. I only hope he will let himself give it to her. And if you wish to do something, you might let the rest of her House know what has happened so she won’t have to answer endless questions."

"Yes...yes, of course," she said.

 

-7-

 

Professor Snape set a brisk pace down an unused back stairway and out across the grounds. Iris followed without a word, relieved to be moving...acting...doing _something_. He slowed as they approached the lakeside, following the snow-covered path that paralleled the shore until they came to a stone bench. A flick of his wand and a muttered word cleared the snow and warmed it and then they sat. Where Iris couldn't see, Snape's hand hovered around her back, approached her shoulder, then fell to his side again.

"I.... Your mother...." He made several false starts and spoke with long pauses between his thoughts. "There was a time--I think you know this--when I was traveling down a very unfortunate road. Two people helped me turn that mistake into...something better. Your mother was one of them."

Iris listened in fascination. She had never heard her father speak of himself before.

"When it was all finished, she and I mistook what there was between us for...something different. By the time we realized our error, we had made each other very unhappy and I had destroyed a...friendship I should have valued more." He took a deep breath and let it out -- nothing that you would dare call a sigh. "We didn't know about you yet when we finally made an end of it. I don't know what we might have done differently if we had--nothing good, that's certain. Neither of us were meant to be parents. Together...it would have been an utter disaster." He fell silent again.

Iris swallowed heavily several times before she trusted herself to speak. "She never had a chance to see my school marks from Hogwarts. I wanted to make her proud of me--and now..." _We fear the worst_ , the headmaster had said. Not that the worst was true. To say it would be to make it true.

Snape grabbed her shoulder and turned her to face him. "She was never anything _but_ proud of you," he said harshly. "Believe that." He stood and walked over to the icy edge of the lake and stared across it. In a much quieter voice he added, " _I_ have never been anything but proud of you. You should know that, in case...." He didn't complete the thought but repeated, "In case." When he turned around he was the Potions Master again, not her father. "That does not, however, mean that your Persuasion Potion will not need vast improvement if you expect to receive acceptable marks for it in class tomorrow."

"Yes, Sir." The response was automatic and full of relief.

"And now, while you may be excused from classes for the rest of the day, I am not. We should return."

 

-8-

 

She is hiding -- hiding in the dark. She must be very young, because she can still fit in the cabinet behind the pantry door. It is always a risk to hide when the Angry Man comes. If it doesn’t work--if he finds her--he'll be even more angry. He’s angry _because_ she is hiding. _A Snape is not a coward._ But he also seems angry because he has trouble finding her. She’s _good_ at hiding. If she thinks really really hard about not being found, then even her mother can’t find her.

The Angry Man will ask about her lessons, and demand that she recite for him. He never likes the results. But school isn’t fun. The other children don’t like her, and she doesn’t know any of the games. And who cares whether she knows the names of all the plants in the garden? The flowers are pretty and she likes making things grow. Isn’t that enough?

He's given up searching for her, but she can hear him talking to her mother in the kitchen, so it isn’t safe to come out yet.

"This is unacceptable. Her schoolwork is never more than mediocre. She shows no interest in any type of formal study."

"Severus, she's a little girl. There's plenty of time for her to settle down."

"I will not have that child showing up at Hogwarts in five years with her head as empty as usual. She needs a solid foundation if she is not to be an embarrassment. She is a silly, dull, timid--"

"She wouldn't be timid around you if you weren't so fierce with her."

"I've had reports from her school. Don't try to blame this on me. Something must change."

Her mother's response is too soft to hear.

"That was not a threat, it was a statement of fact. If you are not capable of raising that child as a daughter of mine ought to be raised, then I will make arrangements to put her in the care of someone who will. Given the helter-skelter life you lead, I should think you would be glad to have her off your hands."

And then there is more talk and her mother is crying, but Iris can’t think about anything but what she's heard. _His daughter_. That can’t be. Why hasn't anybody ever said so? Why doesn’t he act like other fathers do? But the truth of it is inescapable. Everything fits. And that means that he really _can_ take her away if he wants to.

She waits a long time after the talking stops then scrambles out of the cabinet and goes to climb into her mother's lap where she still sits by the kitchen table.

"I'm sorry Mommy. I'm sorry -- I'll be good. I'll work hard in school and I'll learn to read all those books -- even the really big ones. Don't go away. If I work really hard, promise you won't go away."

But now her mother is turning transparent, and her arms are going right through her. "Don't go away, Mommy!"

"I'm sorry, darling." Her voice comes from very far away. "I'm sorry--I can't stay. You didn't read enough books, so I have to go."

 

Iris jerked upright in bed, afraid that she had cried out. It was just a stupid dream. It wasn't her fault. It didn't matter how much she studied or how hard she practiced--nothing mattered. She pulled the pillow up onto her knees where she could bury her face in it to muffle the sobs that she couldn't hold back any longer.

 

-end-

 

[Obviously this is a very unsatisfying place to break off the story. But it was where I stopped writing and at least is a natural pause. To the extent that the rest of the story was planned: Iris receives a mysterious shipment of a rare Daphnid (which I envision as a small shrub with a humanoid trunk, essentially embodying the Greek myth of Daphne) which results in clues to her mother’s disappearance and eventual rescue, with the help of Persephone, Ginny, and Hermione who--if not best friends--at least become friendly allies.]

**Author's Note:**

> This is the only serious fan fiction I’ve ever written. I had ideas for continuing the story, involving Iris’s quest for a cure for the Daphnid blight. But some stories can only exist in a particular nexus of time--they diverge from that point, but their possibilities are erased by further events. I began writing this in 2004, after the publication of Order of the Phoenix and before Half-Blood Prince. The familial backstory I invented for Snape was made impossible by the revelations of the last two books in the series. That wasn’t the only reason I never went further with this story, though it did get me thinking a lot about the nature of parallel universes. Mostly, I realized that even when someone else’s work sparked my inspiration, I couldn’t help dodging off with characters and motifs of my own invention. And I should just embrace that. But when I was doing some file housekeeping, I came across this story again and thought it might be fun to share it. Based on some rather nebulous references to the primary series characters, the setting must be during The Prisoner of Azkaban but none of the actual events in that book are referenced or relevant.


End file.
